


TARDISed Away

by mary_pseud



Category: Doctor Who, Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi | Spirited Away
Genre: Crossover, F/M, Gen, Japan, Magic, Transformation, bathhouse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-11-28 07:36:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11413245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mary_pseud/pseuds/mary_pseud
Summary: While visiting an abandoned Japanese theme park, Rose undergoes a shocking transformation, and the Doctor and Jack Harkness find themselves in the Land of the Spirits.  Can they negotiate with the powerful witch Yubaba to get Rose back?





	1. The Feast

It all started when Rose complained of feeling a bit peckish.

The Doctor remonstrated with her, his long arms spreading wide as though to take in all the TARDIS. "C'mon Rose, the food compilers can make anything-"

"Yeah, and the last seven meals all tasted like orange-flavoured baby aspirin. I just want some real food for a change."

"Real food," he frowned at her, his high forehead creasing.

"Uh-huh," she said sunnily, smiling up at him and ignoring his glower.

He jerked his chin back.

"Well come on Doctor, give the lady what she wants," Jack teased. He was watching the whole interaction from the opposite side of the control console, and finding it more than a little hilarious.

"Real food. Right. Jack - if you could just adjust that dial by your knee-"

Jack did so, and with several wheezings and shivers the TARDIS materialised.

"Here you go - Tokyo Disneyland!" the Doctor said triumphantly.

"Really?" Rose nearly squealed, rushing down the gangway to the doors, the hood of her tracksuit flying behind her. She looked outside, and then looked back, one dark brow arched and a laugh on her face. A warm breeze blew back her blonde hair for a moment, filling the room with the smell of fresh-cut grass and wet bamboo.

"Great. You could at least have landed us here when they're open," she said, and stepped out of sight.

"What?" the Doctor protested, following her; and Jack followed in turn, which gave him an excellent opportunity to admire the Doctor's posterior view.

* * *

Outside was a broad stone street, laid out in a series of shallow steps or levels; and lined on both sides with what looked like food booths. The booths were painted in bright colours that had slightly faded with the sun, but they seemed to be clean and in good repair. The paper lanterns and sliding screens looked Japanese enough, but there were no people.

Even if there were no people, though, the rich smell of cooking filled the air. Hot rice, steamed crab, duck and seaweed and miso soup…

"Definitely not Disneyland," the Doctor frowned, looking both ways.

"How can you tell?" Jack asked, shrugging his shoulders. He was glad he had left his long coat in the TARDIS; this felt like a warm summer day, just right for his light shirt and vintage thirty-fifth-century panelled pants. Skin would have felt even better, but this probably wasn't the time for that, unfortunately. He had really enjoyed the clothing-optional planets and environments they had visited.

"No Mickey Mouse. If this was a Disneyland, every pillar and post would have his face on it. Instead," he frowned at a shallow stone oval rising out of the ground, carved in the likeness of a blank smiling face, "there's these. Which do seem familiar somehow."

"Wait a minute there, Doc. You're telling me that Mickey Mouse is real?"

"Whad'dya mean, real? Of course he's real."

"I always thought he was a myth, like George Washington."

"Well, he's real in that there's a real character called Mickey Mouse - hang on, I've met George Washington! Gave him advice on how to hold a hatchet, and did I ever regret that-"

"Hey!" Rose shouted from one of the side streets. "Hey, d'you have any money?"

Rose waited, but heard no answer. "Fine," she said to herself. She sat down in front of the open counter, and loaded a plate up with crisp fried wontons and strips of chicken breast. "I'll just help myself then. The Doctor'll have money." She felt a little curious as to why there were no staff in view, with all this fresh food here, platters and piles of it: weren't they worried someone would pinch some?

But she wasn't going to, she told herself virtuously. She'd pay up - as soon as the Doctor came by.

She took her first bite, and mmmm'd to herself in pleasure: this was perfect! Just what she had wanted, hot and salty and delicious. She took her second bite and third, and went on steadily eating, faster and faster.

* * *

The Doctor and Jack had gone to the head of the street, walking up the broad stone steps, to see if they could find any signposts. There was a great red and gold pillar here, bearing a four-sided lantern with paper panels, and a carefully trimmed pine tree arching at just the appropriate angle to complement it. But they didn't pay attention to the tree or the unlit lantern; instead their eyes were drawn to the castle.

Well, it might as well have been a castle: it rose above them, floor after floor, with balconies and glowing windows like jewels. Its walls were red, with roofs the green of old copper, and figures of golden dragons coiled across the roofs. A smokestack that looked as tall as a redwood tree rose beside it, topped with a pennant of smoke. A long wooden bridge arched out in front of them, over what looked to be the inlet of a shallow ocean, and the bridge was painted red and gold to match.

"Bath house," the Doctor said. "Definitely Japanese…but definitely not Disneyland." He looked around, scowling again. "But I still think I might have been here before."

"Are you sure we're on Earth?"

"Sure I'm sure! Well, mostly sure. Why?"

"Because of that," and Jack pointed.

The Doctor followed Jack's gesture, and his eyes widened. The sun was setting. It was setting hard: sliding down through the sky like a stone dropping through water, moving far faster than the sun ever moved on Earth. The shadows of the bridge's hand railings grew visibly, gliding across the worn wooden boards as though to bar their way.

"Jack, I think we should get back to the TARDIS. Now. Where's Rose?"

They trotted back down the street, and turned right to where they had seen Rose go earlier. They could hear the sounds of someone eating, but the munching was much louder than it ought to be.

"I knew she was peckish, but…" Jack's voice trailed off as he brushed through the short curtain hanging over the door of the shop and looked at the eater.

The flowing blonde hair was Rose's, but it was hanging from a long cone-shaped head. Tiny dark eyes looked incuriously at Jack, and then the great pink pig wriggled itself off the stool. Rose's tracksuit still clung to its legs as it stood upright and pawed at the counter with its hooves, knocking down a plate of squid. It fell to all fours and started to gorge itself.

"Rose!" the Doctor half-screamed, and the pig grunted in indifference. Then it squealed, shrilly, as something rose on the other side of the counter.

It was a shadow, or a clump of some attenuated jelly: the gleaming steel utensils and wet chopping blocks of the kitchen behind it could be seen through it. It was featureless except for two dimly glowing eyes, and it smacked at the pig with a long switch. The pig fell back, then rooted forward, snout blindly seeking the spilled food. The blonde hair had fallen away, or somehow melted into the pig's skin; there was nothing of Rose about the animal now.

Jack darted forward, and suffered a kick for his trouble. The pig was considerably larger than Rose had been, and heavier as well: it turned on him, eyes emotionless except for driving hunger, and grunted angrily.

"We need a rope!" Jack shouted to the Doctor, who was frantically waving his sonic screwdriver at the pig. "Find a rope!" He menaced the jellylike shadow with his fists, and it swiped at him in turn.

The Doctor spun on his heel and faced a street full of living shadows. Shadows were opening the storefronts; shadows were dripping and lolling along in a parody of walking, or rising up through the ground like smoke. The Doctor charged across the street, dodging the shadows, reached for the end of the rope that hung down from one of the lantern chains - and froze.

He stared, his blue eyes wide, his short hair seeming to bristle on his head.

He could see his hand, and he could see the rope through it. He spun and held both hands up towards the strings of little red lights that were coming alive in the too-sudden dusk, and he could see the lights through his flesh as well, as though they were underwater. Or rather, as if he was water and they were real.

The rope would have to wait for a moment. He ran as fast as he could for Jack.

Jack was babbling as soon as he saw the Doctor. "They took her away; I was going to follow her but-"

"Shut up," the Doctor said tightly, pulling out his sonic screwdriver and adjusting the settings with quick flicks of his thumbs.

"Shut up? What's going on?"

"Look at your hands," and Jack stared at them, and saw a glow around them - a glow that did not disguise their faint transparency. The fingertips were almost gone, the outlines of his fingernails hovering like lines in clean air.

"We're out of phase with this place," the Doctor said quickly. "We need to adjust ourselves or we'll fade out."

"The TARDIS-"

"She can take care of herself, Jack! I need to adjust your phase, now, and you've got to do the same for me, the instant you're solid enough, y'understand?"

"All right. What do I-?"

"Just stand still," and Jack did as the Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at him and waved it up and down, as steadily as a machine. Jack quivered; it felt like invisible fingers were gently prodding at each cell of his body, tapping them very slightly, moving them. But even as his own hands grew more solid, he couldn't help but notice that the Doctor was growing more and more ghostlike.

"Done. Now me!" The Doctor held out the sonic screwdriver across his palm - and it fell through his hand, bouncing off the stones at their feet.

"Oh no." Jack picked up the screwdriver and turned it back on. He couldn't panic, not now. He pointed it at the Doctor and moved it, slowly, up and down, willing it to work, hoping that none of the settings had been changed by the drop. He tried to concentrate on doing exactly what the Doctor had done. He tried even harder not to imagine what it would be like to be stranded here without him.

The Doctor's lips were moving, but Jack couldn't hear him. He forced his hands to continue their slow steady sweeps with the screwdriver.

The Doctor was still fading. He was a smudge in the gloom, a faint glowing outline…and then in an instant he was there, solid as stone.

Jack kept moving the screwdriver until the Doctor reached out and took it from his grip; for a moment Jack grasped his hand, reassuring himself that the Doctor was really there.

"Fantastic, Jack!" he said.

Jack was still recovering from the sight of the Doctor nearly going out like a light. "What was that you were trying to say, when you were - fading?"

The Doctor looked puzzled. "That you were doin' it just right, of course. What else would I be saying?"

"Nothing." Jack leaned over and grabbed his own knees for a moment, getting back the breath that he had been holding too tight. "Nothing."

Then he straightened. "Now we find Rose."

* * *

That was easier said then done. When they traced the path that the shadows had taken the pig, they found themselves in a maze of open-plan barns, packed with thousands of animals. Cattle, chickens in endless bamboo cages, and pigs. Hundreds upon hundreds of pigs.

"No trace," the Doctor said, finally returning his sonic screwdriver to a familiar pocket in his leather jacket. "However she's been altered, I can't separate her out from the rest of these."

"Doctor, they were serving pork back in those restaurants. I smelled it. We have to find her!" Jack's eyes ran over the sea of smooth pink backs again, hoping against hope to recognise something familiar, or to have one of the pigs rise up and turn back into the girl he knew so well.

"They aren't going to be butcherin' all these pigs in one night." He nearly added "I hope," but bit back those words at the last instant. "We need to find out who's in charge, and have them change Rose back."

"And how do you suggest we do that?"

The Doctor shrugged. "When in doubt, head for the most important-looking building you can find."

They both nodded together. The bath house.


	2. The Witch

Dusk had turned to night far too quickly. After Jack and the Doctor threaded their way through an elaborate flower garden, they found themselves near the bridge to the bath house. The great lantern at the head of the street had been lit, illuminating the crowd. They had heard movement as they slipped through the purple and crimson falls of flower, but it was not until they could see exactly who - or what - was crossing the bridge that Jack grew certain they were not on Earth.

Crossing the bridge were - things. Red-cloaked figures with tiny lacquered hats whose faces were covered with elaborately calligraphied papers; things with fur like ropes, and crowned with bumpy antlers; great bundles of yellow fluff that looked identical to the chicks scratching in the dust of the barns, except for wearing leaves on their head and being a little below the Doctor's height; things that looked like walking plants, or bundles of spheres, or things the eye couldn’t quite focus on.

"I know where we are," the Doctor said with sudden understanding.

"Great. Where?" Jack asked, his eyes following what looked like a giant bipedal cat, trailed by a line of black bouncing balls. It was greeted by a man-sized frog in a robe, and ushered through the curtain into the bath house.

"We're in the spirit world, Jack. The land of Japanese spirits."

"O-kay. And you didn't recognise this place before?"

"What, from that lot down there?" He gestured down the descending street, where the ghostly blobs were drifting between the shops. "D'you know how many planets are inhabited by semitransparent beings? Zeta Minor for starters, and then there's-"

"All right, all right." Travelling with the Doctor had made the suspension of disbelief very easy for Jack; he sometimes thought his current disbelief had distinctly helium-like qualities. "It's the land of the spirits. How do we find the head ghost?"

* * *

Far above the bridge, in the highest levels of the bath house, there was an office that was an ornate fantasy of silken carpets and embossed wallpaper and great marble fireplaces, man-high vases and velvet curtains and a desk piled with papers and gems and bags of gold. Before the fireplace, three green and bearded heads lolled, staring aimlessly into space, sometimes rocking to and fro restlessly.

The owner of that desk - and indeed of the bath house - was urgently consulting with a skull that relayed her words to the frogs at the front gate.

"I don't care, and no I cannot send Haku to help you. I'm telling you, there was something with that human girl, and now it's trying to sneak in here. Do not let it in!"

She removed her heavy hand from the skull. Gems flashed on her fingers like cold cruel eyes, no colder or crueller than her own eyes.

"I don't want to get involved in this," she said to herself, before returning to her papers.

* * *

"Right." The Doctor stood just outside the wooden gate that separated them from the road to the bath house. He shook out his arms and checked to make sure his psychic paper was secured in his pocket. "Jack, how long can you hold your breath?"

Jack looked baffled. "You lost me."

"Jack, they probably don't allow humans in here - if they did they wouldn't be turnin' them into pigs at random. But I'm not human. And the way that spirits detect humans is by the smell of their breath. So if I can get through the door, and bring you with me-"

"I can't hold my breath long enough for you to search the place." Jack was breathing deeply anyway, charging his system with oxygen, smelling wet leaves and hot herb-scented water.

"Just until I can get over the threshold, Jack. It may be our best chance to get Rose back." The Doctor reached for the gate, and then pulled his hand back. "And another thing, Jack. Don't fart."

Jack, who had been about to start holding his breath, lost his concentration and dissolved into muffled laughter.

'"Don't fart," he repeated. "Gotcha."

Jack breathed even deeper, then emptied his lungs of air. He pointed emphatically, and the Doctor opened the gate and strode quickly onto the bridge. Jack was close beside him, trying to walk as silently as possible, intensely conscious of the tight feeling in his chest.

The stream of various personages did not part for the Doctor, so he moved around them, politely excusing himself when his leather coat brushed a marching barrel of what looked like tar. He wove through the crowd, and very quickly he was facing a large bipedal frog, wearing a black skullcap and a truly fine moustache and a frown of epic proportions.

"No admittance to-"

"Imperial Bath Inspector," the Doctor interrupted, holding out the little folder with the blank sheet of psychic paper. The frog looked at it, and his eyes opened wide as he saw a frighteningly official-looking document, thick with seals and signatures.

"I - I'll have to inform Yubaba," he apologised, with a bow. "Please wait inside."

"Thank you," the Doctor said with a touch too much emphasis, bowing in return, and slid through the white curtain that hung over the entrance, bringing Jack along by the arm (Jack had been letting the air slowly trickle back into his lungs but the need to exhale was definitely starting to press on him). "And my assistant," he added with a blazing grin, and nodded to Jack.

Jack exhaled with a whoop and the great round-faced women waiting at the entrance all grimaced with disgust.

"Phew, a human!" one of them exclaimed, and they all hid their mouths behind the sleeves of their kimonos. "What a smell!"

"Ignore them, Jack," the Doctor ordered. "Hopefully this Yubaba can straighten things out."

"I'm not sure I can ignore them," Jack said, and smiled his most dashing smile. The ladies were lovely, in a non-human way: great heavy mouths and dark eyes the size of saucers. Their kimonos did not quite touch the ground, and their feet and ankles were adorably plump. Most of them looked affronted at Jack's examination, but a few of them met the twinkle in his eye with one of their own.

"Maybe if we bathed him first," one of them murmured, and Jack's smile widened. Then he stopped smiling at an approaching clatter.

It was a rat-tat-tat like heels drumming on a wooden floor, but magnified until it sounded like machine gun fire. It rolled downwards towards them, footsteps descending flights of stairs with inhuman speed. The curtains leading to the interior of the bath house suddenly billowed outwards, and someone came charging out to stand in front of the Doctor and Jack, breathing heavily.

They looked up at the someone - not just because they were standing in the sunken entryway, but because this person was very large. Very large, definitely female, but not human in the slightest.

She was wearing a prim dark red dress, with long skirt and sleeves and little red ruffles at her wrist. The round gem that gleamed at her throat was the size of a man's fist. Gems shone from her fingers in a solid bar across her knuckles, green and red and molten orange, and her hands were huge, the size of shovels, with red-lacquered nails that came to an unsettling point. But it was her face that marked her most as someone from the spirit world.

Her eyes were piercing, set in a lined face with a prominent mole between her white brows. Her white hair was caught back in a bun, and the entire face, chin to hairline, was nearly the size of the Face of Boe, too large to easily take in at one glance. It was a face and head totally out of proportion to the body that supported it, but she moved with easy grace as she stalked to the edge of the platform and stared down at the two unwanted guests.

Her voice was feminine-sweet with an edge to it. "I left instructions that they were not to be admitted!"

"Yubaba, I'm sorry-" the frog grovelled.

"Good evening," the Doctor took it upon himself to introduce himself. "I'm the Imperial Bath-"

"The Imperial Bath Inspector was just here, he isn't due back for another three thousand years!" The woman leaned down and stared at the Doctor with the gaze of an angry basilisk. "I don't know what you are, but you're too close to human for my liking. You are not welcome here. You must leave at once - both of you!"

"Look, all right, I'm not the Imperial Bath Inspector. I'm a traveller, and one of my companions-"

"Got exactly what she deserved, stealing food which was meant for the spirits!" Yubaba huffed through her nose, and a wisp of steam rose from her nostrils.

"She would have paid - I, would have paid." The Doctor glared up at Yubaba, blue eyes locked on her brown. "It's just a mistake."

"Oh, just a mistake he says." The crowd, of women and frogs and other guests, chuckled at Yubaba's sarcastic tone. "Well, your mistake will make a nice meal soon. She ate our food, we turn her into food. The accounts balance out nicely."

"They do not!" The Doctor's voice suddenly had force in it, strength like a suddenly clenched fist. "I want you to find her, and return her to me. Now."

Yubaba raised her chin. "And why should I go to all that trouble, of finding one particular pretty pink pig and changing her back into a human - that is, if you wouldn't prefer her as a pig?"

Yubaba winked, and the Doctor shook his head no, slowly.

"Very well…why should I go to all that work for nothing? No work without payment, those are the rules here. And what possible labour or service could you, you, you whatever-you-are and this human do for me?"

The Doctor felt a tap on his shoulder; he looked back, ready to snap at Jack for the interruption.

But Jack was smiling, running one hand through his dark hair and shrugging his shoulders as though preparing for a fight. Or at least some sort of combat.

"Excuse me, Doctor," he said with boundless confidence, "but I believe that was my cue."

The Doctor's mouth fell open and stayed open, and a wave of titters ran through the watchers.

"YOU?" Yubaba's laugh was even bigger than she was, and that was saying something. "I think you misunderstand what sort of an establishment I am running here!"

Jack sauntered forward, his face just a bit sly. He gestured, slowly, and with a grim frown Yubaba leaned closer to him.

He tilted himself upward and forward (and only the Doctor noticed how he tucked his arms in to his sides, to draw his shirt tight across his chest) and whispered into one of Yubaba's shell-like ears: shell-like, that is, in relation to the giant carnivorous land clams of Skaro. He whispered, and as he did that great ear turned pink and then red, as did Yubaba's face.

When she finally straightened, the crowd was completely silent, hanging on her every move. Jack just stood there, feet apart, staring up at Yubaba: her flushed face and the beads of sweat at her hairline. They stared at each other for a moment that seemed an eternity.

"I will - discuss - the fate of your friend with your companion. In private," she said, every word just a little too soft.

The doorman-frog's mouth was hanging open now, which was quite a sight when it involved a mouth as large as a frog's.

With just a hint of unseemly haste, Jack peeled out of his low boots and socks, carefully placed them on the ground, and stepped up onto the polished wooden floor. His head barely reached Yubaba's earlobe, but there was nothing but pure masculine confidence in the way he took her arm and strode at her side towards the stairs that circled the walls of the bath house, leading to the upper stories.

"Well then." The Doctor grinned at the gaping crowd. "Since I'm here, why don't I take a look 'round your baths, eh?"

Everyone seemed to be too stunned by Yubaba's action to stop him, so he took off his shoes and socks, carefully placed them next to Jack's footwear, and then went wandering into the bath house, observing the many spirits at their relaxation with eager eyes. He trailed a stream of excited whispers behind him, as the guests and the staff murmured to each other about what couldn't possibly, and certainly was not, happening above their heads.


	3. The Price

The bath house was absolutely fantastic. The hundreds of different varieties of spirits not to mention the staff, the great tubs of hot and cold water all scented and infused with a variety of herbs and minerals to the guests' various tastes (the Doctor pined to go and look at the elaborate boiler system that must be delivering the water: was it magic as well? But he didn't want to lose track of Jack); the huge platters of food being carried along; the sound of raucous diners behind closed doors.

The staff tended to stare, but the spirits apparently accepted the Time Lord as one of their own; he had to find a polite way to reject several offers to dine, soak, scrub, descale, and otherwise relax.

But while he mingled, a part of his mind was not on his current surroundings, or even mulling over Rose's fate: instead it was wondering what might be happening far over his head.

* * *

The upper floor of the bathhouse was silent.

Three green and rather lumpish animated heads were still as three stones, positioned in an irregular line as though listening. Their dark eyes rolled as they looked at each other and away, and sometimes one of them would purse its lips as though about to whistle, but would not quite dare.

The shrill harpy that accompanied Yubaba on her travels, and shared some of her wickedness along with her face, sat on her perch, claws flexing against the wood, eyes wide and perplexed.

Everything was silent.

* * *

The Doctor was having a remarkably interesting conversation with a large white radish spirit about the locomotive habits of the common Krynoid when he heard the sound of Yubaba's heels at his back. But this time they did not tap-tap-tap in a rattle of fury; they moved more leisurely. Sauntering, even. There was another set of footsteps beside them, bare feet padding softly on wood and carpet.

He was expecting a wave of gossiping chatter to follow the sounds of the footsteps, but instead the bath house was falling more and more silent. Almost as though by magic, as the footsteps drew closer, the sounds of laughter and talking were stilled.

He glanced up at the radish spirit, which blinked extremely small eyes at him and pressed one long rootlike arm over what might be its lower face, and then brushed the Doctor's mouth in turn. Now the Doctor could feel it: a weight on his breath, an impulse to not speak, which seemed to radiate downwards along with the approach of the footsteps.

Yubaba finally appeared, her great face rosy and her long white hair disarrayed as though she had taken it down and then put it back up in a hurry. Beside her was Jack, his collar askew and his face lit with the delight of someone who has discovered a new realm and explored it with deep and passionate thoroughness.

"You," Yubaba paused and caught her breath. "You will go now. Your companion will meet you at your blue box. Go now, and do not return."

Jack looked up at her with his most melting glance, and she stared back with eyes like daggers - or considering her size, more like two-handed broadswords. "Do not return!" she repeated. Then she leaned forward, and whispered to Jack. "But if you must come back – come alone." She flicked her eyes at the Doctor, and winked.

Jack winked back and deftly raised Yubaba's hand to his lips, kissing it with aplomb; she withdrew her hand and looked away with an aggrieved expression. He walked past the Doctor and headed towards the entrance, and the Doctor was forced to trail after him, wondering with every step.

They reclaimed their shoes, exchanged bows with the frog attendant, and walked out past the wide-eyed expressions of the round women. The bridge was nearly deserted; most of the guests had apparently already arrived. There was a shadow about midway across the bridge that might have had a face atop it, but it vanished as they approached and then passed it.

"Are you all right?" the Doctor murmured under his breath, as soon as he could speak again - the impulse to be silent, or spell if you wanted to call it that, had apparently broken outside of the bath house.

"Absolutely," Jack murmured back throatily. "Let's get out of here."

They were almost at the far end of the bridge when the Doctor recalled something of importance.

"Jack, there's something you should bear in mind when dealin' with the spirit world."

"And that is?" Jack walked with his shoulders back and his feet light, the very image of a man who has done a good job and knows it.

"They're very tricky, and they're very possessive. I mean, look at Rose: they turned her into a pig, just for eating some food! So if anyone was to, say, filch something from the owner of a spirit world bath house, and then leave the premises. Well."

"Well." Jack paused, and looked at the Doctor with an innocent expression. "Well, what?"

"Consequences, Jack. Dire consequences."

Jack winced, the corner of his mouth turning up in what was not quite a smile. The colour rose to his cheeks as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a ring practically large enough to be a bracelet, set with a yellow gem filled with lights that seemed to undulate under their gaze.

"Doctor, she had piles of these rings. I mean literally, heaps of them all over. She'll never miss-"

"No, Jack. Drop it."

Jack looked at the ring, moved as though to put it on the edge of the bridge - and was stopped by a stranger's hand.

The hand belonged to a boy, or maybe a young man - it was hard to tell. He was small, with straight-cut hair the colour of wet slate, and sharp green eyes. He was wearing the same sort of tunic and shorts that the frogs had been wearing at the bath house. With ill grace Jack looked at the ring, then kissed it sadly goodbye and put it into the boy's hand.

"Good choice, Jack," the Doctor said approvingly.

The boy said nothing; he only inclined his head, hair sweeping forward and then back like two precise wings, and then walked past them, back to the bath house with an even tread.

"But-"

"No."

* * *

"Hey, hi!" Rose was standing in the middle of the street when they arrived back at the TARDIS, moving from one foot to the other. She looked perfectly normal, and the strings of lanterns overhead showed her impatient expression. "Where have you been?"

The Doctor beamed at her, and Jack actually swept her into a hug and then put her down. She laughed at them both. "What was that all about?"

"I'm just happy to see you again, Rose," the Doctor said; a bit of Yubaba's spell seemed to be stuck in his throat, and his words were a little hoarse. "That's all."

"Well, look, I haven't got any money, and I can't talk to any of these people, or whatever." She indicated the moving shadows that were trailing around them, glowing eyes staring at the travellers. "Because, um, I went in one of these stalls and sorta served myself? 'Cause I thought you were right there, and I could borrow some money from you? And I overdid it, I really made a pi-"

"Never mind, Rose, let's go," the Doctor said, taking her arm and steering her towards the familiar blue TARDIS, sitting beside a dusty blue shop whose front was a fantasy of edible sea life: stuffed fish, mounds of lobster, soup bowls swimming with squid ink.

"But I ate a lot, Doctor. I can't remember gettin' a bill, but I owe them-"

"Don't worry about it. Jack paid for you."

"You paid?" Rose glanced up at Jack, and her eyes narrowed at his self-satisfied expression. Then she laughed again.

"You're not telling me something," she teased.

"No, Rose, you're all squared away. Paid in full," Jack said. The Doctor had the TARDIS doors open, and he and Rose stepped inside; Jack paused and threw a little salute to the red lantern just visible at the top of the street, before closing the TARDIS doors behind him.

With a groaning rumble, the TARDIS faded away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This may or may not take place during the events in 'Spirited Away'; Haku is present, and it seems No-Face is on the bridge, but we do not see if Chihiro is present or not.  
> The orange-flavoured baby aspirin food is a striking hostile gesture on the TARDIS' part, and I'm not entirely sure why she did it. Maybe Rose kicked her in an outlet by mistake, or something.  
> I wonder if the Doctor made the mistake of setting the destination as "the most magical place on Earth'? That would explain how they ended up at Yubaba's bath house, rather than Disneyland.  
> The choice of who is transformed by eating the spirit's food is not intended as character bashing.  
> "a giant bipedal cat, trailed by a line of black bouncing balls" - a Totoro, of course.  
> The carnivorous land clams of Skaro are seen in the Fourth Doctor story "Genesis of the Daleks."  
> The Krynoid is an aggressive alien plant in the Fourth Doctor story "Seeds of Doom."


End file.
